Clermont County’s Ted Stevenot plans to challenge Gov. John Kasich in the Republican gubernatorial primary in May, attempting to be the first primary challenger to a sitting Ohio governor since 1978.

Stevenot, former president of the Ohio Liberty Coalition, sent out a statement Sunday evening saying he and running mate Brenda Mack will hold a press conference on Tuesday in Columbus to announce his Republican candidacy for governor. The tea party leader had filed last month to create a campaign committee, but had declined to comment on whether he would run for governor. Reached via text message on Thursday, Stevenot declined to comment further.

Stevenot, of Union Township, has been outspoken in his disapproval of Kasich’s move to expand Medicaid in Ohio under the Affordable Care Act and has repeatedly called on Kasich to pursue right-to-work legislation. His running mate, Mack, of Canfield, is the former president of the Ohio Black Republicans Association.

Both the Republican and Democratic parties face division entering the 2014 election season, with Southwest Ohioans seeking to challenge the presumptive nominees in both parties.

On Monday, Hamilton County Commissioner Todd Portune said he would start a Democratic campaign for governor, even though Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald already has the endorsement of the Ohio Democratic Party and the Hamilton County Democratic Party. In addition, before the state party officially endorsed FitzGerald in September, Democratic party chairs from 63 of Ohio’s 88 counties had endorsed FitzGerald, and he has the stamp of approval of the county chairs’ association.

Portune has said FitzGerald’s campaign is struggling to gain support and says he has more experience than FitzGerald. So far, Portune’s announcement has received little enthusiasm from other Democrats, with many saying his primary will be wasteful and needlessly divisive.

The Republican Party has struggled with its own divisions for most of 2013. Tea partiers lost their bid to take over the chairman’s position of the Ohio Republican Party, but then started to talk about withdrawing their support from Kasich in the 2014 election. In August, Stevenot told The Enquirer that if the loss of tea party campaign money and votes meant Ohio elected a Democratic governor, so be it.

“If you had a Democrat governor, Republicans in the House would have been more united in opposing Medicaid. So it’s not the end of the world,” Stevenot said.

If he succeeds in his bid to get on the ballot for the May 6 primary, Stevenot will be the first primary challenger to a sitting Ohio governor since 1978, when Charles Kurfess unsuccessfully took on Gov. James Rhodes. The governor then won re-election that November.

Chris Schrimpf, a spokesman for the Ohio Republican Party, said he thinks a similar scenario will play out in 2014, with Republicans uniting behind Kasich after the primary.

Kasich “will win the primary, and he will go on and beat Todd Portune or Ed FitzGerald,” Schrimpf said. “The issues facing the state are so great, and the differences between the parties are so great, that when Governor Kasich wins, I think you’ll see a unified party moving forward.”

But Republican state Rep. John Becker – who, like Stevenot, is from Union Township – said Stevenot’s candidacy can only encourage Kasich to be more conservative.

“The (mainstream) party, they’re going to unite behind Governor Kasich without regard to what Ted Stevenot does,” Becker said. “The tea party voters, Kasich’s already lost them. Is it going to make a difference in the general election? It might.” ■